


Four Minutes

by cynthia_arrow (thesilverarrow)



Category: House M.D.
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-11
Updated: 2013-03-11
Packaged: 2017-12-04 23:29:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/716291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesilverarrow/pseuds/cynthia_arrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everybody's got to write a "House steals Wilson's lunch" cliché story, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four Minutes

**Author's Note:**

> The following was originally posted many, many moons ago on livejournal. I'm just archiving it here. It was written during season 4.

Wilson just wanted 15 minutes alone. Fifteen minutes and a fucking peanut butter sandwich. Was that too much to ask?  
  
It had already been a horrendous day. Not one, not two, but  _three_  patients with particularly cruel prognoses. An unexpected but expectedly nasty call from ex-wife number two. Nurses getting snippy with him for no discernible reason. Coffee on his tie. A looming mound of paperwork. Myriad other things both legitimately awful or simply annoying that just seemed to compound to make his day into a big ball of frustration. And it was only 11:30.  
  
He had been fairly certain House was on clinic duty with Cuddy breathing down his neck, but it somehow didn't surprise him to see House come barreling into the lounge just about the time he took down the paper plates and began to undo the twist tie on the bread.  
  
House was rambling about something, and Wilson couldn't even hear the words, just the tone, and it grated. So he did something unwise: he attempted to ignore him. It was necessary, he told himself, if he wanted to avoid a homicide. If he had to open his mouth to speak to House, he might kill him. So he stood there, silently smearing the peanut butter over the bread, fuming.  
  
House was in the middle of the room having a conversation with himself that apparently had something to do with Foreman being an "idiot" and Chase being "an even bigger idiot" and Cameron being the "worst idiot, the kind that's hard to manage without a penis"; but he stopped, mid-rant, suddenly fixing his eyes on Wilson and the paper plate on the counter between them.  
  
Luckily, Wilson moves faster than a man with a cane. Most days.  
  
"Dammit," Wilson said as he jerked the plate away and stepped back with it, his heels snapping loud against the cabinets behind him.   
  
House rolled his eyes. "Someone's apparently PMS-ing today," he said with a playful smirk.  
  
That? Was too much.  
  
"No," Wilson said. "Someone's had a bad morning, bordering on epically miserable, and he doesn't want to talk about it, but, of course, here he is, talking about it, sacrificing part of the fifteen minutes he has to sit down and eat something he is going to stubbornly call a sandwich but is really only two pieces of stale bread barely held together with some dregs of peanut butter, which"—he chuckled miserably—"isn't even mine, because you used the last of  _my_  peanut butter and now I have to eat the crunchy kind, and you know I hate that."   
  
As Wilson took an exaggeratedly deep breath and then sighed, House let a beat go by. Then he said, "You realize you slipped right out of the third-person there?"  
  
Wilson glared.   
  
"Okay, so you do," House replied.  
  
"You know, you could at least pretend to give a fraction of a shit about my bad day."  
  
"But you'd know I was pretending."  
  
"That's not the point."  
  
"Which is…?"  
  
Jaw clenched up tight, he said slowly, "You can't have my sandwich."  
  
"Well, generally when someone acts like a territorial dog at the food bowl—"  
  
"And you know what else?" Wilson pointed a finger at him sternly, not caring how foolish it looked. "You're not going to come knocking on my door tonight, acting like nothing's bothering you when something clearly is, or else you wouldn't be ranting and raving about your fellows before lunch, and all you'll want to do is use me to…purge it or something. It's not fair, and—"  
  
"Who said anything about fair?"  
  
"I always know it's not fair, but I let you do it anyway. Not tonight. I have enough of my own shit to deal with."  
  
"This is twice in one conversation that you've sworn at me. Are you sure you haven't—"  
  
"God, House! Could you just shut up! Or could you just try to be a human being? I know you're capable. I know it pinches and stings—no, I take that back, maybe it just bores you—but you're capable. For me." He held up a finger. "For just one day."  
  
"Which day?"  
  
Wilson snorted and turned his back, picking up the plastic knife to cut the sandwich. He would not dignify it with an answer. He wouldn't even continue this conversation, as good as it felt to rant, because it was looking like House could easily be the straw that broke the camel's back, as he often was.  
  
But then, almost against his will, Wilson's brain started going: what day was today, for God's sakes?  _September. Eight times 31…240, plus eight, 248…then for February, not a leap year…three less, 245…thirty days have September April June and November…two then…243…and today is the—fuck…eighteenth?…ten is 253, eight is 261._  
  
He turned around and said: "Day 261."  
  
A small, curious smile bloomed on House's face. Wilson could see the gears turning, and for a moment, he was almost certain he'd counted wrong. If he did, House would catch him, and no jury in the world would convict Wilson for committing the murder that would follow close on the heels of the man's snide grin.   
  
But after a moment, House simply shrugged and said, "Okay."   
  
"Okay?"  
  
House nodded and pushed himself off the counter, coming around it slowly, unassumingly—which was enough to make Wilson nervous. When he reached out his hand, Wilson thought he was going for the sandwich, and he didn't even have time to think about whether it would be cruel to bury a plastic knife in a man's cane hand before House laid that hand on his cheek and leaned in and kissed him full on the lips, softly but surely.   
  
After a moment's shock passed, Wilson kissed him back, a little hard at first because he was so tense, but without much effort House coaxed his lips into parting, and when he slipped his tongue inside, Wilson felt something desperate well up inside him, all the stress threatening to overflow and convert to passion. About that time, though, House broke off the kiss with a tug at his bottom lip and drew back, opening those blue eyes wide for a fraction of a second before he moved off, leaving Wilson just a little stunned.   
  
House leaned himself back against the opposite counter, looking him over—and not even particularly lasciviously—without saying a word. Resignedly, Wilson took half his sandwich off his plate and handed it to House, who did an admirable job covering a smug smile as he took a bite.  
  
He thought they were about to settle into one of their companionable silences when House suddenly said, "So, Wilson, are human beings allowed to give fantastically relaxing blowjobs, or should I just wait until midnight to come over, when it's day 262 and I get to go back to being…an alien?" He frowned, his eyes narrowing in deliberation. "Or was it a pumpkin?" He shrugged his shoulders.   
  
House waited just long enough to see that he wasn't going to get a snappy reply before he picked up his cane. Poking Wilson gently in the kneecap with it, he propelled himself out the door, shoving the rest of his half of Wilson's sandwich into his mouth as he went.   
  
"Nine," Wilson called after him.  
  
"Beer," House called back without turning around.  
  
Wilson glanced at the clock. Eleven minutes.   
  
No, he thought. Nine and a half hours. He sighed, but at least now he was smiling.


End file.
